Perth

After a quick peek at the highlights of Sydney, Jessie and I left early the next morning for Perth. I was pleasantly surprised at how relaxed it was to fly domestic in Australia. We had great customer service from the Quantas folks and security was a breeze after traveling in the US. The flight is not too long after our long trek the day before, only about 5 hours.

Jessie booked a beautiful hotel for us with a view of the Perth skyline across the Swan River. Which was a good thing for me, I didn't listen to the advice of my pharmacist cousin and the jet lag and massive time difference really caught up with me. After plying me with orange juice, I was tucked up in bed to take a nap while Jessie did some wedding errands and picked up up some snacks for dinner.

With a view like this from our balcony, it is hard to think you are missing out on seeing Perth by chilling in your hotel room! We had a nice relaxing night watching TV, nibbling cheese and fruit and oohing over Jessie's beautiful wedding clothes. An excellent way to ride out a crash day, if you ask me!

The next day we were back at it early, we met Aunt Terry at the airport to pick up Justin, flying in from Carnarvon, and my folks, who spent an extra day in Sydney. Then we all caravaned on the 4 hour drive down to the Margaret River wine region for the wedding. http://www.margaretriver.com/ This picture was taken after we met up with Justin's mom, Heather and her partner Andy. Jessie and Justin made us reservations at Must wine bar.

http://www.must.com.au/MMRfolder/index.html If you have a napkin handy for the drool, check out some of the amazing things on their menu. The plate above was a shared entree (appetizer) with Mom and Dad. Head cheeses, potted meats, pickles and tapenade. Amazing!! Almost everyone had their dry-aged beef, but I couldn't resist the roasted rabbit gnocchi. A great kick-off to the wedding weekend!

Day one: Sydney

After flying for entirely too long, we left Fairbanks at 8:30 am on May 13th and arrived at 6:30 am on May 15th in Sydney. We decided we should hit the ground running to try to get onto the local time as soon as possible. As I said, our hotel was in the rocks so we walked to the opera house and got a good view of the Sydney bridge. Also in this pic one of the many ferries in Sydney harbor, not the one we took, but similar.

Then we walked into the city for some amazing dim-sum. We even tried chicken feet! Very tasty, but a little gelatinous and bony.

After lunch we decided to take a ferry across the bay to Manley Beach. The ride was a nice 30 minute sit down, and for the most part nice and calm. And we got to dip our toes in the South Pacific!

After the ride back on the ferry and a glorious view of the Opera House at sunset, we went to a historic pub near our hotel for some Aussie beers and wines and some funny varieties of pizza. Even some with kangaroo! They weren't too bad, but then we are kind of pizza snobs :) and anytime you try to pretty up rustic game meat it is usually only okay.

An excellent start to our AU adventure!

I'm baaaaaaack!

Just a teaser of the great pictures I have from my awesome down under adventure! The flights are long but worth every second of sitting in a cramped airplane seat to stand up in my cousin Jessie's wedding. And we got to see some amazing things in Australia too!

So this is the beginning: We flew from Fairbanks to Seattle then on to Los Angeles. From there on a giant Qantas plane to Sydney, a 13 hour flight! Were we were met by Jessie, and after a quick clean up onto some serious sight seeing.

The hotel Jessie picked for us is in the historic rocks district in Sydney, just about a block up form the Circular Quay, where the Opera House and Sydney bridge are. How cool is that? We touched the Sydney Opera House! We were all tired and jet-lagged but you just feel so surreal. Like maybe you walked into a postcard. :) Lots more tomorrow, and probably the rest of this week! Kyle says to tell you I have about 600 pictures of my own, not counting the 1500 Mom and Dad took and the wedding ones that are trickling in...don't worry, I won't post alllll of them!

Happy Birthday to Kyle 1.0

Kyle had to work on his birthday, so we will postpone the major celebrating for Friday. But we couldn't let the day go by without at least having a special meal! On the menu for today naan, Greek inspired seared steak and some vegetables. With creme brulee for dessert!

Mmmmm tasty pudding with flame!!

And Lorna joined us for dinner :)

I think a pretty OK birthday, for a week night!

Another Honor Roll

I couldn't resist putting this pic up...you can't see the rest of Liam, but it is soooooo him right now! The assembly was actually the 17th, but end of quarter was March 9. I am sure there will be one more for this year then on to High School!

Break-up

Just a few pics to show how much the snow has melted. Spring is definitely here!

Bao

Liam loves steam buns, we have found some decent frozen ones from Safeway, but Rose doesn't really care for the sauce that is on the pork filling. (It is very sweet.) I found a package of mix to make the bun part at one of the asian markets here in town. It smelled a little stale when i started mixing it and I'm not sure I followed the directions correctly...resting, mixing, and kneading all seemed to be used interchangeably. Anyways, they turned out pretty well. I made a simple filling of ground turkey seasoned with more of a Thai bent (onion, pepper, ginger, garlic, fish sauce, soy, sugar). Abbie Rose liked the flavor better, but I should have pureed the peppers and onions instead of leaving them diced. The texture still bothers her to eat. Next time I plan to make my own dough, in the meantime there are 6 more from this batch waiting in the freezer :)